Convicted pimp found guilty of more charges in federal court

Sunday

A Philadelphia man, sentenced to 40 to 80 years in Bucks County for pimping women out of a Bensalem motel earlier this week, was convicted Friday in federal court on sex trafficking charges.

Enoch Smith, 36, also known as “Drees,” and “Idris,” was charged with sex trafficking of a minor and production of child pornography by federal authorities. The U.S. Attorney’s Office said the evidence and testimony in his federal trial showed he operated a prostitution business in the city between April 2009 and June 2011.

He recruited young women, including at least one 15-year-old, to work as prostitutes and created Internet advertisements for each prostitute on a website known as Backpage.com. He had sex with the women and many of them lived with him, according to authorities.

Police conducted an undercover investigation into the Backpage.com advertisements and busted Smith in June 2011.

When police searched his computer they found nude images of at least one juvenile who was working for Smith, according to authorities. He was initially charged by Philadelphia police and then the case was adopted federally.

The case mirrors the recently concluded case in Bucks County, in which Smith was convicted of giving his prostitutes heroin to keep them addicted and needing his supply, while also giving them a “wake up,” of crack cocaine so they’d be lively dates for their clients.

He kept the money they earned on their dates.

One of the mothers of a young woman in the Bucks County case said Smith preyed on the women’s disease of addiction to his own profit. Bucks County Common Pleas Judge Wallace Bateman said Smith essentially enslaved the women.

In the federal case, Smith faces up to life in prison. His sentencing is scheduled to occur Oct. 31.